Mount Blanc, the highest peak in the Alps and in Europe, is 4810 m high and was climbed for the first time on August 8th, 1786. The climbers, Jacques Balmat and Francois Paccard, left in the afternoon on 7th August and returned victorious in the morning of 9th having spent two nights in the open. The film reconstructs this great event with all the problems it entailed and solved thus contributing to the beginning of the modern concept of alpinism.